Did you know that Instagram is actually a word combination of “instant camera” and “telegram”?
The photo- and video-sharing platform was acquired by the almighty Facebook in 2012 and has a total of 600 million active monthly users (and growing) as of last year. With so many potential leads, it’s important that your business adds this form of social media to its repertoire.
While the mobile app is fairly easy to navigate, here are a few of my prized Instagram hacks for beginners to level up your Insta game:
- Bookmark posts.
Do you see that little flag-like button to the right of the heart, speech bubble, and paper airplane? That’s the Bookmark icon, one of Instagram’s newest features. It allows users to save posts.
We suggest Bookmarking photos and video content that give you inspiration for your next campaign, provide insight into your competitors, and so on. The best part is that people can’t see what you’ve Bookmarked, so sneakily click away.
- Break up a boxy biography.
The bio section of Instagram doesn’t give users enough space to include your business’ location, contact information, website, and more. To avoid a boxy look, add line breaks via mobile by following these directions:
- Open the Notes app.
- Write out your business bio, including line breaks, as you’d like it to appear on Instagram.
- Select all the text, and choose Copy.
- Open Instagram.
- Tap the person icon to visit your profile.
- Tap Edit Profile.
- Paste the text into the bio field.
- Tap Done to save the changes.
- Enjoy your aesthetically pleasing copy.
To do it on a desktop, visit Instagram online, select Edit Profile, write out your business bio as you’d like it to appear, and click Submit to save the changes.
- Save drafts.
This is for those times that you’ve snapped the perfect picture and can’t think of a caption, or you want to post but it’s not the prime time for engagement. Instagram finally listened to its users and put a Drafts section above the Camera Roll.
Simply double-tap the back arrow in the top-left of your screen then click Save Draft. When you’re ready to revisit it for editing, tap the + icon, then select Library. - Rearrange your filters.
In my experience, no one ever uses Toaster or Kelvin. (Who wants to look orange?) To put your least favorite filters at the end, scroll to the end of Filters and click Manage. Press and hold the three lines to the left to rearrange the filters, or uncheck the circle to the right to hide that filter.
PS: This is also a great trick to find some of Instagram’s hidden filters like (my personal favorite) Ashby, Brooklyn, Helena, and Charmes. - Juggle multiple accounts.
Logging in and out between your business and personal accounts can get annoying -- fast. In fact, it might become such a struggle that you forgo posting on your business account altogether.
Don’t let this happen. This hack will make life so much easier for those who have two or more Instagram accounts to manage:
- Tap the person icon to visit your profile.
- Tap the gear icon on iOS or the three dots on Android to visit Options.
- Scroll to the bottom, and select Add Account.
- Enter the username and password for the other account.
- Once you’ve added the other account, the profile icon in the navigation bar will change from the silhouette of a person to your profile picture.
- To switch between accounts, press your profile picture in the navigation bar until a menu of your accounts appears.
- Select your desired account, then Insta your heart away.
There you have it- my Instagram hacks for beginners. I’ve given you (most of) my insider secrets to tackling Instagram for the first time. If you’re looking for more advice on social media management and marketing, contact us by clicking below. We’d be happy to help!